The Project Gutenberg eBook, Successful Recitations, by Various, Edited by
Alfred H. Miles

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Title: Successful Recitations

Author: Various

Editor: Alfred H. Miles

Release Date: December 22, 2005 [eBook #17378]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SUCCESSFUL RECITATIONS***

E-text prepared by Roy Brown

SUCCESSFUL RECITATIONS

Edited by

ALFRED H. MILES

1901

"Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly
on the tongue; but if you mouth it, as many of our players do, I had
as lief the town-crier spoke my lines."--_Hamlet_. SHAKESPEARE.

London:
S. H. Bousfield & Co., Ld.,
Norfolk House, Norfolk Street W.C.
London:
Printed by H. Virtue And Company, Limited.
City Road.

PREFACE.

Many things go to the making of a successful recitation.

A clear aim and a simple style are among the first of these: the
subtleties which make the charm of much of the best poetry are lost
in all but the best platform work. The picturesque and the dramatic
are also essential elements; pictures are the pleasures of the eyes,
whether physical or mental, and incident is the very soul of
interest.

The easiest, and therefore often the most successful, recitations are
those which recite themselves; that is, recitations so charged with
the picturesque or the dramatic elements that they command attention
and excite interest in spite of poor elocution and even bad delivery.
The trouble with these is that they are usually soon recognized, and
once recognized are soon done to death. There are pieces, too, which,
depending upon the charm of novelty, are popular or successful for a
time only, but there are also others which, vitalised by more
enduring qualities, are things of beauty and a "joy for ever."

But after all it is not the Editor who determines what are and what
are not successful recitations. It is time, the Editor of Editors,
and the public, our worthy and approved good masters. It is the
public that has made the selection which makes up the bulk of this
volume, though the Editor has added a large number of new and less
known